Water Aid - 12 Days Of Christmas. Cd....
Quizzes & Puzzles6 mins ago
Can someone please tell me what's going on ?
'Labour Claims ‘No Rush’ on Chagos as UK Prepares to Offer Billions to Mauritius'. Guido
Are we giving them away and paying billions & all before Trump, who doesn't want it to happen, takes office.
I'm really confused.
As dave says, Mauritius has no legitimate claim to the Chagos Islands. The only tenuous links the two once had is that the Chagos were claimed by France during their occupation of Mauritius until they, along with Mauritius, were ceded to Britain in 1814.
It was the French who established permanent settlements and industry in the Chagos and it is unlikely that many people in Mauritius would even have known they existed at that time.
From 1814 until 1965 (when Mauritius gained its independence from the UK) the Chagos were administered as a dependency of Mauritius (itself a dependency of Britain) and upon granting Mauritius its independence, the Chagos were not part of the deal.
It is only following a non-binding United Nations declaration that the UK saw fit to open negotiations aimed at granting Mauritius sovereignty over the Chagos.
But instead of telling the UN (which has become an increasingly anachronistic and bizarre waste of time and money) to go forth and multiply, the previous UK government opened talks (though I believe these stalled before the GE).
Quite why it did so is anybody’s guess because the displaced Chagossians have little more in common with Mauritius than I have. Even more puzzling is why the UK government feels the need to accompany the transfer with barrowloads of taxpayers’ cash.
Hopefully the Trumpster will haul our new man in Washington, "Lord" Mandelson, into his office and provide him with some "advice" to relay back to the idiot Starmer.
//Quite why it did so is anybody’s guess because the displaced Chagossians have little more in common with Mauritius than I have.//
Furthermore the displaced Chagossians want nothing to do with Mauritius and many of them live there and in the UK and Seychelles. To make it even more tenuous the displace Chaggonians are themselves an Afro-Asian ethnic group originating from freed African slaves brought to the Chagos Islands, specifically Diego Garcia, Peros Banhos, and the Salomon island chain, in the late 18th century. LOts live in Leeds and Manchester and fancy a big payday for doing nothing. Socialist then?
There is less confusion when you realise that the UK government is extremely hard-of-thinking, and have difficulty identifying their, er, elbow, from a hole in the ground.
Of course it may all be a political move to get Trump to invade, and then he can deal with other nations trying to claim the islands is, or should be, theirs. It'd be good practice prior to Panama, Greenland, and Canada. Perhaps he could get a second opinion & professional advice from Putin ?
Chagos deal looks now in doubt; 🙂
https:/
Donald Trump will be allowed to be consulted any deal for the UK to hand over the Chagos Islands to Mauritius is finalised.
A Downing Street spokesperson has confirmed it was "obviously now right" for the President-elect administration to consider any deal with the Mauritian government, which is seeking further concessions over the proposed deal.
Mauritian Prime Minister Navin Ramgoolam’s Cabinet did not sign off on the proposed deal on Wednesday and is instead sending a delegation back to London for more negotiations.
Reform UK deputy leader and Boston and Skegness MP Richard Tice told GB News: "This is amongst the worst deals in history and must be cancelled. We own the islands, Mauritius have never owned them, why would we pay someone to take our sovereign territory that we already own. We must keep it!"
Shadow foreign secretary Dame Priti Patel said: "This is a complete humiliation for Keir Starmer and David Lammy and marks yet another failure of British diplomacy under Labour.